Located in south-central Tibet near the border of Nepal, Shishapangma is the fourteenth highest mountain in the world and the lowest of the eight-thousanders—peaks in the Himalayan and Karakoram mountain ranges that exceed a height of 8,000 m (26,247 ft). Scaled in 1964, it was the last eight-thousander to be climbed because China imposed severe travel restrictions on foreigners at the time. It is considered one of the easiest eight-thousanders to summit; nevertheless, how many have died trying? Discuss
Source: The Free Dictionary
The 
One of history’s great polymaths, Kircher was a German archeologist, mathematician, biologist, astronomer, musicologist, and physicist who knew Hebrew, Aramaic, Coptic, Persian, Latin, Greek, and various modern languages. He tried to decipher one of the most ancient writing systems—Egyptian hieroglyphics—but most of his thoughts on the subject proved incorrect. An avid inventor, he built playful devices including a talking and eavesdropping statue that used a primitive intercom, and what else? 
Automobile racing originated in France in 1894, almost immediately after the construction of the first successful petrol-fueled autos, and it appeared in the US the following year. Open-road races were banned in France in 1903, however, after they led to 8 fatalities. Today, there are several different categories of racing. In open-wheel, stock-car, and other types of circuit auto races, flags are displayed to communicate instructions to competitors. What does a black flag signify? 
Of all the bewildering things about a new country, the absence of human landmarks is one of the most depressing and disheartening. 
Before the issuance of the Penny Black—the first adhesive stamp to indicate prepayment of postage—letters were commonly paid for by their recipients. Part of an effort to reform the antiquated British postal system, the stamp featured a profile of Queen Victoria. Because its dark background made cancellation marks hard to see and made reusing stamps quite easy, it was soon redesigned. To this day, all British stamps bear a profile of the reigning monarch and are the only stamps not to list what? 
The Spel van Sint Evermarus, or the Game of St. Evermaire, is a dramatic reenactment of the slaying of eight 
Considered one of the founders of neuroscience, Ramón y Cajal was a Spanish histologist and Nobel laureate. He devised a method of staining nerve tissue that allowed him to study the structure of the nervous system and make many important discoveries. In 1906, he shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with Camillo Golgi. Though he was a highly respected researcher in his adult years, he often got into trouble as a child and was imprisoned at the age of 11 for doing what? 
The sunflower is a plant native to the New World and common throughout the US. Its stem can grow up to 10 ft (3 m) tall, and its flower head, commonly having yellow rays, can reach 1 ft (30 cm) in diameter. The sunflower was domesticated around 1000 BCE in the Americas, where the Incas venerated it as an image of their sun god, and it reached Europe in the 16th century. It is valued today for its oil-bearing seeds that can be made into bread. The sunflower is the state flower of what US state?